@TinkishDelight: Of all the companies in the brackets, for me personally, T-Mobile is awkard stand-out. I’ve never had anything but positive, customer friendly experiences with them. Honestly if there was a best company bracket I think I would nominate them.

@TinkishDelight: I would agree. I’ve only had one bad encounter with their Customer Service (confusing issue trying to buy a new phone and switch from a family plan to an indivdual plan), but it was handled immediately on the second call. I wouldn’t even consider the encounter bad from a Customer Service perspective, throughout the call, they maintained a high level of courtesy and professionalism.

@noone1569: I wish I had a G-1. I do love my T-mobile though. I was on a 3000 minute regional plan for 49.99 a month and they changed me to the unlimited nationwide plan for 50.00 a month with no problem. When I get a job again a G-1 is mine…

I have had some problems with T-mobile in the 9 years I have been with them (partially voicestream) but they have always been quick to remedy the situation and their prices are good, for a cell company

@edwardso: my mom before she passed away, was with t-mobile since they started up as Omnipoint… I have her old Omnipoint phone as well, it has classic 1990’s stylings. it can either take a nickle cadmium battery or four AA batteries… man they dont make phones like that anymore…

but chea for those who dont know it went Omnipoint>VoiceStream>T-Mobile…

I would totally would go with T-Mobile, but I found that MetroPCS (which just moved into this area) has unlimited minutes/txt/web for $40 a month (and thats without a contract) which that whoops the @$$ of every other Prepaid/Contract celluar service in my area (in terms of price).

@SegamanXero: “but chea for those who dont know it went Omnipoint>VoiceStream>T-Mobile…”

Um…No. You are wrong.

From T-Mobile’s own website, ” From the merger of General Cellular and Pacific Northwest Cellular, Western Wireless grows into a PCS provider for several western and southwestern states as well as Hawaii. After a successful public offering by Western Wireless, VoiceStream Wireless is launched”

So yeah for those who don’t know they didn’t start as Omnipoint, they just bought omnipoint at one point.

@edwardso: I am an old Powertel>Voicestream>TMobile customer and echo the sentiment that they are really one of the better carriers customer service wise.

Sure the coverage is spotty in the east b-f rural areas. I was willing to live with that when I signed on in 1998 because they had Euro spec sim chips. This was back when all the other carriers were still flogging the old tech which eventually everyone needed to convert from anyhow.

I just flipped my out of contract plan to the $49.99 deal and I asked three times “This doesn’t create a new contract?” and was told three times “No.” by a very cheerfull person.

@theblackdog: They tend to be the only type of store other than Staples/Office Max/Wal-mart where I’m from.

That said, if it comes down to it, I will go without before I ever do any more business with Best Buy, or even set foot in a store or click on their website. I wouldn’t even use them for the touch-here-buy-there that you can get with a B&M store.

@MrPibbistheGreatestSodaEver: No need to be assholes. Yes the PSP technically worked as advertised, but there’s a specific clause that lets Best Buy take 60 days to attempt a ‘fix’ even when they know damn well that the problem is unfixable and they could have just given you a new replacement right there. Sitting on giving you a replacement for 60 days, just because they can, is bad business and something completely valid to complain about. They did this to me when my 360 red ringed. They told me they had to send it away to be repaired, even though there is no way a 3rd party could appropriately repair a red-ringed xbox. They waited precisely 60 days before telling me what I already knew that it couldn’t be repaired, and then gave me one off the shelf. Since they were going to give me one off of the shelf anyways, why not give it to me 60 days ago? You could argue that they needed time to asses the repair, but there’s no way that takes 60 days.

@Michael Belisle: I got the TV but only after they ordered the part, oops-didn’t order the part, the part will be here in 3 days, the part cannot be had, the part is on backorder, and a lot of leave a number and someone will call you within 24 hours (which they never did). About 3 days after we got the new TV the part was delivered to my house. I still have it. If you need a certain circuit board for a 2001 Toshiba rear projection 52″ screen TV, I can give you a good deal…

@tbonekatz – hey, you’re lucky, took us over a year and a visit to a lawyer to get BB to do ANYTHING. We went through the same thing with the parts – “on order” “oops lost” “on order” “oops lost” They even called us to find out if we had the part! Finally they just said “tough, if you want it fixed you have to bring it in.” The lawyer’s letter helped them decide to honor their warranty agreement. As far as I’m concerned we can end the voting right now – BB wins hands down.

@tbonekatz: Did you have to stand at the counter arguing with the employee as to whether or not the damage was intentional or not? When our camera died I figured no problem, we had the BB warranty, but I had to wait and have the manager sign off on the work order that my minor scratches on the camera were indeed “regular wear and tear.”

I have T-mobile and as far as I am concerned they haven’t done anything wrong yet. The service is solid and the sales reps were very easy going when buying the phone and were not pushy into making me upgrade and get extra services that I do not need.

Yeah, I’ve read all the stories online. But in my personal experiences, Best Buy’s never done me any wrong whereas trying to deal with T-Mobile and cancellation was like slowly beating myself to death with a dull stone.

I actually go out of my way to make sure I don’t buy anything from Best Buy. 2 days ago, my brother asked me for a ride to the local Best Buy in Chicago to buy Resident Evil 5. I took him to the Gamestop 2 miles further from my condo.

There’s a Best Buy in downtown Chicago on Roosevelt. That’s beside the point.

I work at GameStop, which is practically right across the street. My coworkers and I have busted our buns to “help the customer”, which is something GameStop isn’t exactly known for. We also have another GameStop across the street from us. (Long story…)

We have people that come specifically to our store, simply because we know our “stuff”. We know what to recommend, we leave people alone when they want it, and when they have a problem, we do everything that we possibly can.

No offense taken from your comment, I agree with it to a point. But my Chicago-area GameStop rocks, and I will defend it.

the entire setup of Best Buy bothers me. To get to the registers you have to go through a long line that is narrow, tethered and lined with displays. You can’t even change your mind without rubbing against people. That being said, the husband just got a $275 gift card from credit card rewards and we need a new computer

@Michael Belisle:
are you serious? Best Buy is a foot note compared to Wal-Mart. It’s revenue is about 40 billion, whereas Wally and Marty’s is almost ten times that. That would seem to say Wal-Mart not only sells more items, thus having more interactions with people, but also has a much larger market share. that’s what I call fail.

It baffles me that Best Buy is dominating this so much. You have a choice when it comes to buying electronics. Crutchfield, Amazon, eBay, etc, but you don’t really have a choice with cell phone providers.

“What do you mean you don’t have a choice? AT&T, Verizon, Sprint…these aren’t choices”?

When all of them collude with one another to keep prices artificially high, no, there isn’t a real choice, just the illusion of choice.

I stopped buying from Best Buy years ago. Their selection sucks and their prices are terrible. I’m still stuck with AT&T and even if I left, I’d just be jumping into a bonfire instead of an oven.

@chris_l: I think the issue is that there is no where else to go if you need it that day and cannot wait for Newegg or Amazon to ship. In my case the nearest BB is about 45 min away so if I am stuck I have to choose betweeen Target, Walmart and Kmart and needless to say the electronics sections in those 3 stores are abysmal.

That is a perfectly fine point, but my argument would be let’s compare how often that happens along with the difference between Best Buy and Amazon vs. the money you’re spending at a crappy American provider for mediocre service compared to let’s say, any provider in Europe or Asia.

Yes, your hard drive might crash and you spend $100 at Best Buy vs $65 on Amazon, but how often does that happen? You’re comparing a rare occurrence that probably doesn’t cost that much money vs a bill you’ve been paying every month for YEARS.

Hm. I had T-Mobile as my carrier in Europe for, I think, 9 years, and was very happy with them. They took over One2One (crappy provider I’d switched to from Vodafone – Vodafone is great, but is, or at least WAS, at the time, outrageously expensive) in the UK and despite the fact that T-Mobile is/was unglamorous and unexciting in the extreme, they always pulled something out of the hat come contract-renewal time that kept me as a happy customer until I moved to the US many years later. In fact, they wanted me to transfer my service (number and all) to the US when I moved here, and offered me some very sweet deals to do so. I declined, based on the fact that my now-husband already had Verizon, and was going to add me onto his family plan.

Within about, ooh, two weeks of my move Stateside, I was wishing so very, very hard that I’d taken T-Mobile up on their service-transferring offer.

They’re not perfect, by any means, but in my experience they’re very reasonably priced and have some surprisingly good customer service.

Best Buy, on the other hand… yeah, I developed a severe aversion to them long ago. I can’t even be bothered to recount one of the tales of Best Buy appallingness I experienced before announcing “enough! I am never setting foot in one of those stores again!” – it’s just run-of-the-mill downright abysmal customer “service”, as in “failure to provide any customer service of any kind, and failure to even pretend to give a shit”. Ugh. I hate Best Buy.

As others have said, while all carriers have their flaws, I think the general consensus is that T-Mobile is among the least objectionable.

I find their prices to be much better (especially a Blackberry unlimited data plan), their customer service to be acceptable (for the common customer, I now get exceptional service from a dedicated Rep as I’m on a corporate account), and the network speed and quality to be as good as anything else I’ve used.

We’ve been with T-mobile for 3 years. When we initially signed up we had a small problem, but we called the CSR and we were pleasantly surprised at 1. The rep was American! (no outsourcing) and 2. she was friendly and helpful. A far different experience when dealing with our previous carrier – Sprint. Shutters.

I am actually going today to sign up with T-Mobile and so far I like what I am hearing. I was with Sprint and of the cell companies ive been with they are, hands down, the worst. Horrible CS and horrible products. Rumor, anyone?

I too have had wonderful experiences with T-Mobile. Signing up and ordering my G1 was painless and I haven’t had any problems that weren’t immediately fixed when I called customer service.
The agents are also always really nice too. I had one who seemed disappointed when she couldn’t tell me any neat shortcuts on my G1 that I didn’t already know.

Why is T-Mobile even mentioned in this? I’ve been with the “T” since 99 (voicestream)and the only complaint with the “T” is their spotty cell coverage in rural areas, other than that customer service has never let me down and I like 24hr support right here in America.

With their accurate winnings in the customer service category year after year and their eagerness to give me free minutes just for asking, I’d say that should get a slot on the best company in america not worse…

I’m with everyone else on the T-Mobile thing. I’ve had them for 2 years.
I have a blackberry plan with 1000/min, unlimited text & internet for $60/mo [with a 10% freelancers union discount].
Find that anywhere else.
When I switched to my blackberry they were AMAZING. They have a whole division just for blackberry users to call. They answered all my questions and seemed to be happy to do it, never got that feeling when I called Verizon.
Haven’t had a problem with coverage and generally LOVE them. I’d like to have an iPhone but just might do the G1…I’m not leaving T-Mobile.

We’ve been with T-Mobile for about 6 years now. Their service is great, they never mess up your (mine, anyway) bill, and I’ve changed my number with them hassle-free 4 times, gone through 2 deployments with my global phone on their service, and kept my grandfathered plan for about 5 years.

They’ve always been very responsive.

Best Buy…makes me uncomfortable in their stores. I’ve never had a problem beyond the fact that I am a Woman, and therefore Know Nothing.

@RStui: I applied for a job there when I was in college. I had extensive experience with electronics, and was thinking perhaps that would be a good department for me to work in.
Silly me, they thought I should work in home appliances. Also, the guy who applied the same time as me was offered ONE of the positions in electronics (the interviewer even told me there were multiple). Needless to say, I walked out.

Since then, I realized I’ve never seen a woman working in electronics at Best Buy. Maybe it’s just the ones near me, but it’s been 10 years, so you’d think I would have seen at least one.

I partially understand the BBY hate, but it still irks me. Comparing BBY to Amazon, NewEgg, Monoprice, etc. is like comparing apples to oranges, or more accurately, a B&M store to an internet store. I’m tired of the little babies on this site whine about how cheap amazon and newegg are when compared to BBY. Of course they are – no overhead equals cheaper prices. If Best Buy wanted to compete with those stores, then they wouldn’t have any brick and mortar locations.

I agree that it’s smart to shop online and save money, but that doesn’t mean that Best Buy is the evil corporation that it’s being made out to be. Keep some perspective.

T-Mobile is awesome, so I don’t know why it’s even on the list. If anything, it should be in the Best Companies category.

Oh, and to the guy that said go to Gamestop over BBY…that really made me chuckle. I question anyone that has a problem with BBY but not Gamestop.

@ZenMasterKel: I found this hilarious as well, but given the choice between the 2 and the fact that that video games are not essentials to life I would have to say I would prefer to go without in this case.

If I buy the game at Gamestop I get an opened sold-as-new game with a million stickers plastered on it.

If I buy the game at BB I risk getting signed up for magazine subscriptions automatically and there is a higher chance that when I get home and open the game I will find an AOL coaster in there or nothing in the package at all, try explaining that to the service desk clerks…

I agree. Hands down Best Buy is the worst. I’ve been lied to every time I go to Best Buy. Now ATT, that’s a different story. With their overbilling and terrible customer service they rank up there with Best Buy as the worst company EVER.

I don’t understand why T-Mob is even in the running. I’ve been using T-Mobile since about 2004 (aside from a 1 year stint with Sprint *shudders*) and I’ve never had any bad experiences with them. Even now I am happily enjoying my G1.

Also when my battery sudenly stopped holding a charge for my G1 late last month I simply took it into the nearest store, the emplyee ran back and grabbed me a new one, and I was off again. No hassle, no paying, no trying to upsell.

With customer service like that I don’t care if ATT gets the iPhone, or if Sprint gets the Pre… customer service > than both those phones combined.

@noone1569: You give the Mustang too much credit. ;) I see it as more going from a Toyota Corrolla to the Ferrari. The current one isn’t gonna win any beauty contests or set records on the Nurburgring, but it’ll run forever, isn’t bogged down by being too high tech, and will hold up alot better when it hits a telephone pole.

I’m simply waiting for the G1 to get a rollcage before I pick one up. =^^=

I hate the fact that there’s only two big companies that provide service on GSM. Their online account management system sucks. They try to get you to autopay and often do not let you see the bill until days before it is due. The phones suck. They contracted HTC to build underpowered smart phones with such low memory that they constantly freeze up (Touch, Wing, G1) while AT&T at least has Fuze.

I had a one year agreement with T-Mobile and they refused to honor it since they want everyone to have 2 year agreements. I ended up paying $200/line to cancel. Even though the value of the phones was far less than that. Customer service is nice as long as they are getting their way, once you give them a problem they transfer you to the guys that get an attitude and will hang up on you.

Agreed. The big problem with their customer service is that the customer service reps have access to your account, but they can’t sell you a phone; the sales reps can get you a phone, but they can’t see your account. Over the past three months, I’ve spent upwards of 10 hours on the phone with T-Mobile getting bounced back and forth between the two call centers.

Definitely Best Buy hands down. I use Tmobile for my service and have had only a couple of minor issues that were easily resolved but don’t EVEN freaking ask me about my Best Buy issues. Let’s just put it this way, they have cost me thousands of dollars without even an apology. I will NEVER EVER buy any high end anything from them EVER again. NEVER!

It’s worth nothing that Clark Howard (leading national consumer advocate) has said time and again that T-Mobile wins tops in customer service. Granted, he notes that all cell services score low, but T-Mobile remains higher than the others.

The winner is clear, best buy has spread their evil to Canada, not only with Best Buy store but by also owning Future Shop. What other company will build to competing big box stores in a town to create the illusion of competition?

I just left verizon to go to T-mobile and after going in the store at att i was cornered by a salesman telling me all sorts of rubbish i didn’t want to hear. i knew exactly what i wanted, and what type of plan, and he kept trying to upsell everything.

i went in to T-mobile and they were super friendly, very down to earth and when i told them what i wanted and what plan, they gave me exactly what i wanted AND it was cheeper than my verizon plan.

so I’m very glad to leave verizon, not go with att and sign up for the next 2 years of my life to T-mobile.

as for best buy? meh, I’ve worked there, and they treated me like a dog.

Seriously, why is T-Mobile here? I’m looking over the articles with them tagged in the last year and it boils down to articles about cell companies in general, their executive email list, ETF prorating/how to, two success stories, priase, and two complaints (one of which was resolved in the success story). The remaining complaint about the broken cellphone is a bit weird anyhow.

But really? You balance it all out and there’s essentially one negative story in an entire year, with more amounts of praise, and they’re somehow in the running for Worst Company?

I have to agree with the majority sentiment here. I’ve been with Verizon, I’ve been with Sprint. I’ve been with T-mobile for the past 9 years and they are with out a doubt the BEST wireless carrier in the US. Sadly for Best Buy, there’s no way they can win this particular match-up.

I’ll join in the T-Mobile group love. I have been with them since 2002. I briefly considered switching because they didn’t have a presence in Puerto Rico, so every time I visited I was charged by the minute (my plan is a flat rate). I really didn’t want to have to switch. On my last visit I saw that they have a presence there now and was quite happy.

Boooo for including T-Mobile! Although with my luck now that I rave about them, they will screw me on something! But still, booo!

I can’t believe all the t-mobile love. I’m a new customer and they have been one of the worst companies I have ever dealt with. I wasted hours on the phone being switched between sales and service and never got much help. Their online support is a total joke. I hate them with a white hot passion.

Wow, I’m astonished by all the T-Mobile love. True story: I set up a new account with them on 12/22/2008 and ordered a phone. It is now March 26th, and they still have not been able to deliver me a working phone.

It has been, by far the biggest retail nightmare of my entire life. Everyone at T-Mobile is perfectly polite; no one there is interested in actually helping me.

BBUY wins this with ease. They tried to charge me $189 for a monitor they had on sale at the store (we even verified the price with one of the employees looking up the serial # and model of the LCD) for $129. I walked out and found the same monitor for $99 on newegg instead.

Let’s see Best Buy vs Gamestop. I’d have to find a way to vote against both of them. Ugh.

Me, I’m a happy Newegg customer and staying that way.

T-mobile has been fabulous both in person and over the phone for customer service in the 4 years I’ve been with them. Had AT&T/”whatever their name is this week” for 18 months before that. UGH. Never again. Not even if you gave me a free iPhone and offered to pay the bill forever.

T=mobile helped me burn the backside of my house when I couldn’t call 911 from their phone…but I hate WorstBuy more than I hate shopping Costco on Saturday mornings with all the freebie stands and melty eat-beasts trough eating instead of shopping.

I had T-Mobile for 2 years and never had any issues with them. Their customer service was friendly, helpful, and not in India. The only reason I switched was because my parents offered to put me back on their Verizon family plan at no cost and I couldn’t turn that down. I would gladly recommend T-Mobile to anyone.

Been with T-mobe and predecessor almost a decade and have asked for supervisor several times to compliment customer service agents.(yes, they DO speak English and are always friendly and knowledgeable). Even tho I’ve been after them a long time about direct payment of a fixed amount, like my car insurance, they still consider me a “valued customer” and recently indicated they will be upgrading my service to unlimited minutes at no extra charge. Is something big happening in the industry or are they just doing some price-matching…or maybe, like the agent explained, they actually are realizing how important customer retention is.

I did some contract work up at T-Mobile headquarters in Bellevue, WA. Not only were they the cheapest company insofar as providing training for their employees, but most everybody who worked there was rude. And these weren’t even the customer service employees.

The best part of that whole work experience was a Nordstrom Rack directly across the street and great sushi nearby.

@Datacloud: What department did you work in? I’ve worked there and found the exact opposite: no expense spared in training and the friendliest people I’ve ever worked with. The only problem they have are the corporate laptops are junk. Although, most people did treat contractors as second class citizens. They even enforced it with the yellow badges.

Best Buy-
I am STILL waiting for my laptop that was “sent in for repair” (missing for 5 years, now) while my desktop that was “fixed” SIX times for the same reason (despite your lemon policy) sits in the closet gathering dust.

Phone companies get more complaints no matter how good they are, because people deal with them constantly, and recieve variable monthly bills. The only other product I can think of like this is credit cards.

People don’t deal with Best Buy every single day, and don’t have a monthly bill with complicated charges from Best Buy. So, people are much more likely to have problems with phone companies, and the companies naturally have way more complaints (even if they’re not worse).

I am not sure T-Mobile should be considered an evil company. I know other people here have said the same thing. I have had great experiences with them. They are a good company in an evil industry though. My experience is that they have been the exception. Their service (coverage) my lack simply because they are not as large as others, but they make up for a lot with great customer service.